You really missed IIF's point here. He is not "hating" on soft martial arts, nor is he claiming that they are martially ineffective. He is stating that your original statement regarding the internal or soft martial arts is incorrect for reasons you did not understand based on your reply above. He already knows the internal arts are valid combat arts when trained in the appropriate manner.

As one of the "haters" in this thread, let me point out that I've done years of tai chi with push hands, and have used it effectively in competition with resisting opponents. So, I'd say you're making a false dichotomy, when you're saying you're the one defending soft arts when you say "even non-combat styles such as Tai Chi".

You have seen why the members here see Hapkido (when trained dead) as unrealistic so basically have two options you can either try training against resisting opponents and judge our opinions for yourself

Or continue in the world you know reinforced that you were right all along, happy in your ignorance

I found this website and it took me about a year to test it for myself I wish it hadn't, but everyone has their own journey

As one of the "haters" in this thread, let me point out that I've done years of tai chi with push hands, and have used it effectively in competition with resisting opponents. So, I'd say you're making a false dichotomy, when you're saying you're the one defending soft arts when you say "even non-combat styles such as Tai Chi".

I've used what amount to push hands/chi soa or whatever it's called in Judo kumi kata (grip fighting) for years. Most people who have decent "grip fighing"skills in Judo do it,although dont' really practice it constantly. After being on Bullshido for a while,I realized that it works pretty well, and can see the utility of it (the push hands/sticky hands/arms) type of training.

The article by Marc "Animal" MacYoung simply mistakes poor training/teaching with the concept of aliveness in training. He also conflates sports grappling training with effective self defense training.

So he is guilty of either being ignorant or of indulging/engaging in the same sort of false advertising that he complains (rightly so!) about.

fucking hilarious

Falling for Judo since 1980

"You are wrong. Why? Because you move like a pregnant yak and talk like a spazzing 'I train UFC' noob." -DCS

Bully dngrRuss has a basement hapkido school in CA and used to host Bullshido throwdowns there. He did a little knife seminar followed by some knife sparring with everyone. He's really quick and tricky, especially for a big dude. Knife sparring was done the way Cold Steel teaches/trains it, and he worked for their company. Wasn't sure how much of it was actually related to his hapkido, though.

OP, if your still looking at this. You will get picked on this site because your failing at understanding other peoples point of view.

First two years of your training are filled with being naive. This hapkido stuff hurts like hell and my teacher treats me like a rag doll. You will have the same ability in a years training with any new student. The question is will you be able to hang in there with someone with a years training in other arts.

Hapkido is great but at the same time it sucks and doesn't work. A proper school will teach you the right way, they all say they are the golden school and all the other hapkido schools are fake.

Here is the problem as part of your curriculum you have to drill a lot to remember your techniques and to become proficient at them. As you are training your partners are supposed to give you different levels of resistance. There is supposed to be training in techniques where your partner does random attacks and you respond with the first technique of your liking. All this on top of actual full resistance sparring.

A lot of the Korean masters had this kind of training on top of it they trained in Judo which substituted lack of aliveness in their Hapkido curriculum.

So lets say you put in 10 years of hard core Hapkido training with all the things i described above. You had a great teacher that was "combat" oriented and would say he didn't like some of the techniques he thought you but had to since its part of the curriculum even dough they were not very effective. Lets say 10 years in your having one of your sparring classes, lets say its grappling only no strikes. Guess what its going to look like Judo not much more Hapkido will add to it. This is what most people on here try to relay to you. Why not go to a style that trains the right way from beginning to end with out a lot of fluff in the middle, this way you avoid going about the the truth the long way.

Personally I discourage people from learning Hapkido, not because I don't think its a bad art or useless. I don't want any more half ass practitioners in it to further **** up its name. Better to have the art die then to become crap.

I would suggest going to a boxing/kickboxing gym and asking someone other than a complete novice to punch you a couple of times. If you can catch the punch into an armlock, then keep training. All the more power to you.